P2P Delivery seminar

The applications of P2P technology are wide ranging, standardisation has started and practical stumble blocks remain, that could be a short summary of the P2P Delivery Seminar organised with the EBU D/P2P Group. At this event key industry players ranging from service providers to CE providers, and of course including pioneering broadcasters, presented their use of P2P technology and their experiences. A sort of a 'P2P state of the union'.

License fee Arguably the biggest compliment any broadcaster's P2P trial could receive was the one Marius Arnesen (NRK) shared in his talk. After being provided with a popular TV programme via P2P donwloading, an NRK viewer remarked he immediately started paying his license fee, something which until then had not appealed to him. Not as easy as it seems Brandon Butterworth, the technical guru behind BBC's iPlayer developments, put the audience' feet back on the ground when he explained why the current network topology and pricing model in the UK ADSL infrastructure is not necessarily favourable to P2P applications. He did not exclude however that the BBC will use P2P more in the future, something which is currently being looked at in the European P2P-Next project.

Marius Arnesen (NRK)

Leave your television on, please
Marc Stuart (Pioneer), a very active P2P-Next partner, predicted a big future for P2P-enabled CE devices. He joked in future people may leave (part of) their televisions on when going on holiday, so their P2P sharing gauge can move higher. CE device P2P standardisation has already started as part of the DVB-OICD work.

For more information on this topic, what broadcasters are using P2P for, and how to get involved, please contact: Franc Kozamernik .